Charred
by kaleidoscopedisaster
Summary: Ghosts of the past imprisoned in bodies of the living, trying to start a fire with used matches.


When she looks back, maybe she'll realize that they were never compatible. They were simply two souls who knew the same trials. All they ever did was repeat their past's mistakes. The emotions that he interpreted from her composed expressions were never truly what she was feeling. He never wanted her look, her touch, and especially not that face she made whenever she succeeded at something. What good were these relations if it only brought suffering on both their parts?

Everything about her burned. Even a simple glance from her, inflamed his whole existence either in fury or desire. She could make a whole room smell like smoke and perfume. The smell would linger in his skin, clothes, and sheets no matter how many times he tried to scrub it out. Her attitude towards him flickered with every wayward wind. She was never truthful about her emotional state. She spoke little and clarified even less.

Their language was composed of two dialects. The first was the tiny gasps of ecstasy that was the sound was when she felt something. Whenever, her legs quivered or her spine arched. There was a period of silence for her to catch her breaths. Then the moment would pass and they would carry on trying to please the other without any real conviction. The other was through the intensity of her eyes. If not the eyes themselves, then by the way her eyelids folded over those dark, violent orbs. Her eyes told him the story. Her eyes narrowed and a hard look in those violet eyes meant trouble for him. Her eyes soft and the creases relaxed showed that she was thinking and content. She had told him that she could tell his state by how much he slouched and the inflection in his voice. He found the latter funny. They didn't speak. How could she even hear the nuances in his tone when they spent hours in silence?

She was a flame. She danced for no one but didn't mind the audience. She was around but never was there when he needed her. He could never touch her quite enough or kiss her quite right. She left when she was finished and there were no other questions. She looked to the mirror, fixed her askew hair, and put on a new coat of lipstick while he laid motionless on the bed. He thought numerous of times to tell her what he thought. A scream building in his throat that this wasn't working. They could have a fresh start and _be_ something to each other. That he didn't know how much more of this he could handle. Yes, he had been cruel but she was agony. She was agony in a designer dress. He never said anything. He stayed in bed and her scent continued to choke him into silence. She didn't say goodbye as she closed the door to his apartment. Why would she do that when she didn't even say hello?

She would appear at his door and ask, "Jadeite, will you have sex with me?"

She never called him by his new name. She would knock on his door and ask him this difficult question while she was still in the doorway. He knew why. He knew she didn't want to be trapped in civil conversation. This question made his brain churn. He wanted to, for the most part, he was ready when she was ready. But sometimes he wanted to say no and for her to stay. Maybe they could talk or—

"That's fine. Goodbye." This was the only reply given after he stumbled through some excuse to conceal when he was feeling particularly upset at the state of their relations.

However, this night in particular differed from the rest. He spent the day writing down all the jumbled thoughts in his head. He ignored the blue lines of the notebook and wired his spiraling words through the text he written before. These thoughts were the ones he had pushed aside to not deal with their pain. His mind moved in two different speeds, fast and slow. It was as if he was having a breakthrough but he wasn't sure what kind yet. He was unhappy with what he was, became, and what he would become. This realization of self-hatred was choking him and a sudden feeling of loneliness stirred inside him. As if his pain was her signal, there were the three raps at the door.

He closed his notebook, pushed himself off his bed, and chunked his pen onto his makeshift table of a broken table top balanced on a mini fridge and a chest. He ruffled his hair to make himself look what he deemed presentable while he walked to the door. As usual, she was in a conservative but tight dress and her dark hair cascaded down her shoulders and back. Her lips painted in the matte color of blood and they formed the only six words he knew she meant. Her face remained still but he could feel her disgust radiating off. He wasn't ever sure if that disgust was in him or her.

"No, but you can stay. I wouldn't mind the company." He said, mustering all the courage he could. He could see that they were both shocked with his honesty. Her eyes went wide and her mouth fell open just a bit. It took just a few seconds longer before she regained her icy composure and shook her head.

"I'm not here for your companionship." Her face remained composed and unchanged. "Thank you." She about-faced and began walking to the elevator. He felt something inside him quiver and break. His resolution? His tact? He wasn't sure but he opened his mouth and his thoughts came out.

"Yeah, well, I'm kinda sick of being your drink at the end of the night." He called after her. She stopped midway and turned back. Her curtain of hair unveiling her shocked expression. He couldn't help but relish in this. They were speaking. She was emoting. "I mean be normal and do some fucking yoga or pick up smoking. I'm sick of it."

"Do you think you have _any_ right to say something like that?" She snarled. "You were the one who suggested it. _You_ were the one who said you'd be satisfied with just this. It was you who said that you could handle these encounters. This arrangement has always been mutual. I have never made you do _anything_. Just because you can't—" She cut herself off but her glare never left his eyes. "You made your bed a long time ago. I was just foolish enough to lie with you."

This is where he could take fault. Their affairs consisted of echoes of their past lives' interactions. He wanted his body to burn again with desire. He wanted to gaze at her with the intensity of their first life. A gaze that spoke volumes of lust, admiration, and fear. He wanted to feel the heat of her fingers clinging to his flesh. Her hand wrapping around the back of his neck and snaking through his hair. He wanted more. He longed for the softness of her arms as she fell asleep holding him in their serene embrace. Although he had once enjoyed the feel of her nails carving ripe flesh into his back, he couldn't help but think it wasn't an act of passion. Every time they touched it was mechanical. It was a memory of the heat of a blaze that had long gone out.

He sighed. "Yeah. Yeah."

She shook her head in disbelief. "That's it? Was the entire point to rile me up?" Her voice was wet as if she was on the verge of saying something.

"No." He was defeated. Her logic had once again gotten the best of him. He couldn't repeal with some emotional statement. Not only would she immediately have a reason but it would also destroy the fantasy that one day she might bend on this. She searched for an answer in his eyes and when she could not fine one, her eyes went cold.

"You're unbelievable, Jadeite."

"It's not Jadeite anymore." Exhausted, he said his weak defense. That was the name of a withered stone that should have washed away with the tides of time, it wasn't him.

"That's the only thing you'll ever be to me." She sneered.

This wounded him and he could tell she knew it would. In her eyes, he was still a traitor. In her eyes, he was the same apple that casted her out of Eden. Thing. He wasn't even a person to her. He wanted to tell her he had changed but it wouldn't have done any good. He could tell she wanted to fight him. She wanted to burn him into ash once more and he almost let her. He thought about how he wanted to feel her fire. How his death would be an exertion of passion. Her hand around his neck as the flames consumed him. He felt the pang of the loneliness again. He thought about Endymion and the other kings. He thought about how her companions would look to her in disgust. He couldn't do it to them.

"Are we done?" She, once again, regained her composure. Her eyes closed and her breaths even. He hated how she had tamed herself. Mars wouldn't have let him live.

"I think we are." He said with a nod. She rolled her eyes at his comment thinking that it was some coy, indecisive response. She didn't see it as him ending their apathetic exchanges. He watched her walk away for the last time and shut the door.

He stormed into his bedroom and pulled out the suitcase from underneath his bed. He threw it on the bed where her scent still lingered. The suitcase bounced and opened. He went to his closet and grabbed the pile of clothes on the floor. He threw them in the suitcase from where he stood but most ending up littering his bed. He grabbed a rolled up grocery bag from off the floor and moved to the bathroom. He grabbed his toothbrush, toothpaste, razor, and comb. He tied the handles into a knot and threw it on his bed as well.

After he packed up his things, he grabbed the envelope of cash between his mattresses and put it in his back pocket. He turned off his GPS signal on his phone so Mercury would at least have a bit of a struggle finding him. Before he left, he rummaged through his messy kitchen drawers and fished out a napkin and a pen. He pulled the cap off with his teeth and wrote down in his sloppy penmanship,

**_"I'll be back when you need me. – J"_**

He put it on his refrigerator with a magnet and stuck the pen without its cap in his pocket. He grabbed the handle of his suitcase and walked out of the old apartment. He stuck his key on top of his door frame and left.

When he was riding on the bus out of town, he realized in the note he wasn't exactly sure who or what he was referring to. He envisioned the note for the future royal court as the audience. The only reason he had any contact with them was for the fight for their promised kingdom. Yet he had the nagging notion that he intended it for her. He hated how she just slipped underneath his skin and every intention he had changed for her. He hated Mars so—it hit him. All this time, he was so upset at her for not calling him his current name when he had never called her _Rei_.

He was looking for Mars in Rei's body. He saw Mars in the bedroom and in her anger. Rei's composure unnerved him because he was looking for Mars. He pressed his head against the bus' window and exhaled.

What was Rei looking for?


End file.
